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Tag Archives: encounters

When I rejoined my husband, the first thing he said was, “I love that perfume!”

“That’s just as well,” I said shortly.

Here’s what had happened: I’d taken refuge from the weather in a shop. Guiltily aware that I wouldn’t be buying anything, I sniffed at a series of perfume stoppers. Some customer in a fishing hat, a pair of white socks with sandals, and a bag with a picture of Liza Minnelli on it was chattering with the saleswoman about the exorbitant price of neighborhood tea and his depression. “Maybe some cologne will help your day,” said the saleswoman. Read More

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Guess who I ran into this morning? Three guesses. And if you guessed Jacob, my neighborhood friend, you’re right!

I was enjoying a toasted, buttered bialy, a coffee-cart small, and a newspaper on a traffic island, when who should sit down on the bench opposite but my old comrade-in-arms! He was looking very natty in a bright green fedora and tweed jacket. On his lapel was a button that read POLITE NEW YORKER. Read More

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Yesterday I had one of those moments of everyday wonder that helps tint a life. I’m still not sure where it came from, exactly. I was getting a stirrer for my tea at a downtown coffee shop—no place fancy or very expensive—and there alongside the sugar and the milk and the napkins were the little packets of honey. Packets of honey! Suddenly I thought, Wow! Honey is made by bees! It was found in the pharaohs’ tombs! And here it is being given away for the price of a cup of water. I realize strict vegans must think about this all the time, and maybe it’s no more extraordinary than the ready availability of salt and pepper, once prized and fought over; or sugar, with its fraught history; or, for that matter, water itself. And yet, it was the honey that struck me. You never know what will jump out for you. (Somehow the fax machine has always remained the most wondrous piece of technology to me, more like Wonka Vision than anything more modern.) Read More

It was so cold that most of the flea market’s usual vendors hadn’t shown up. The blacktop playground was bare. Customers were so scarce that one seller chased us down the street offering ever-lower prices on a painting. We said no thank you. We didn’t need it.

Then, indoors, after flirting with a wide velveteen belt and a souvenir spoon, I came across a stall selling books. I picked up a copy of the Little Golden Book Pantaloon. “You’re not old enough to have read that,” said the seller, who was wearing a woolen cap. “I can guarantee that.” Read More

Contrary to popular wisdom, in my experience many of the best comebacks are not cutting. L’esprit d’escalier is all well and good, but take it from me, zingers aren’t what they’re cracked up to be: when you grow up in a family that fights almost exclusively below the belt, you learn to wound early, and also that the act of attacking leaves you feeling bad, not triumphant. I’ll never forget being snapped at by an angry customer in a deli as a small child. “Ignore her, Sades,” my dad said loudly. “She’s an unhappy, lonely person with no one in her life who cares about her.” I’ve forgotten her expression of shocked misery; I know that only from my dad’s rueful telling. Read More >>

Contrary to popular wisdom, in my experience many of the best comebacks are not cutting. L’esprit d’escalier is all well and good, but take it from me, zingers aren’t what they’re cracked up to be: when you grow up in a family that fights almost exclusively below the belt, you learn to wound early, and also that the act of attacking leaves you feeling bad, not triumphant. I’ll never forget being snapped at by an angry customer in a deli as a small child. “Ignore her, Sades,” my dad said loudly. “She’s an unhappy, lonely person with no one in her life who cares about her.” I’ve forgotten her expression of shocked misery; I know that only from my dad’s rueful telling. Read More